


Bloodright

by Shadaras



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harrow Nova, Canon-Typical Necromancy, Gen, Ortus Ninegad's corpse is here too but he's dead so he's not really a character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:00:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28020567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadaras/pseuds/Shadaras
Summary: The only way Harrow Nova can stand as cavalier primary is to kill Ortus Ninegad.So, of course, she does.
Relationships: Gideon Nav & Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 10
Kudos: 46
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Bloodright

**Author's Note:**

  * For [argentconflagration](https://archiveofourown.org/users/argentconflagration/gifts).



> Thank you to my wonderful beta! :)

“You actually killed him, huh.” Gideon’s voice echoes in the crypts. There’s some wonder there, but very little surprise. Gideon’s footsteps are solid and sure on the stone, chased as always by the rattle-click of the bones she wears. “Didn’t think you had it in you, Nova.”

Harrow ignores her.

In front of her is a colossal lump of flesh that had, three minutes ago, been animated—however clumsily—under its own power. It had been named Ortus Ninegad: A would-be poet; a sparring partner; someone who perhaps could have been almost a friend, if Harrow had ever been allowed such a luxury. Now he is a pile of material—fat, muscle, bone—waiting to be rent asunder and set to the Ninth House’s purposes.

A rapier sticks out of his chest. It is black, as everything is in the Ninth House save the bones they hold so dear. It is covered in blood, as is the floor, and the body’s face, and Harrow’s hands.

She has seen many dead bodies before (it is impossible to avoid, considering the Ninth House’s specialities), but this is the first body she has seen transform from a living soul to lifeless flesh.

Harrow does not think she likes it.

She hides that reaction, shuts it behind the mask of ash and bone painted on her face, and turns to face Gideon Nav. “You _dare_ underestimate me?”

Gideon’s red hair is a coat of blood on her scalp, a wild blaze of color in the monochromatic sameness of the Ninth House’s devotees. Gideon’s golden eyes are coin-flat in the lazily-painted skull Harrow knows Gideon only wears because her revered parents force it upon her. Harrow _aches_ to smear it, to slather mud upon the false face that Gideon does not respect enough to be worthy of. Gideon’s teeth glint in a perfect smile, and she says, “Nah.”

One syllable. She isn’t even worth a _sentence_ in the false Daughter’s eyes. Harrow grinds her teeth and pulls Samael’s chain free of the corpse as she stands. “Why are you here, Nav?”

She has never been able to force herself to call Gideon by her stolen title. No matter the lies her Reverend Parents tell the other Houses, and which Harrow will—horror of horrors—need to abide by once they travel to Canaan House, here in their home Harrow refuses to bow: She, not Gideon, was born Reverend Daughter.

Gideon doesn’t seem to notice what Harrow calls her, which rankles. She hates how hard it is to rile up a person who doesn’t attend to details enough to realise there might be something to _defend_ herself against. Instead, Gideon’s smile broadens, and she tilts her head. The knucklebone earrings slotted through her stretched earlobes rattle at the shift. They’re obscene. They are an offense to the dignity of the Ninth House and a child’s parody of the elegant wind-chime earrings of bone Harrow wishes she had the right to wear.

“Gotta collect my cavalier, don’t I?” Gideon’s eyes flicker down to Ortus’ body. She sighs, and her gaze slowly returns to Harrow. “The Reverend Mother never said a name, so you’ll suffice.”

Then Gideon snaps her fingers and the corpse lurches upright.

Harrow _seethes_ at her casual display of power, and snatches her rapier out of Ortus’ body before it can lumber away. “ _So_ kind of you to say so,” she snaps. Automatically (because Aiglamene and Crux and Ortus alike would have scolded her if she didn’t), she cleans the rapier of the blood before she sheathes it again. If she had been the Daughter her parents expected, she would do it with a thought, more easily than Gideon raising Ortus’ body to her command.

As it is, she uses a cloth, and her hand, and her anger.

“Come on, Nova.” Gideon turns, and her boots click perfectly on the floor. “Time to face the music.”

There is no music.

There is nothing _resembling_ joy on her Reverend Parents’ faces. The skull makeup may hide many expressions to those not versed in looking past paint and to the person beneath, but Harrow is very skilled at such acts; she has lived her whole life with paint more familiar than bare faces. Her Reverend Father is resigned. Her Reverend Mother is angry.

“You have forced Our hands,” Priamhark Noviusvianus says, his mouth twisting. “Child, you transgress.”

“I _transgress_?” Harrow does not blink. She does not retreat. She has been preparing for this moment since she was five years old, and she refuses to let this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity be stolen from her. “I am _claiming_ what is mine by right, Father.”

She doesn’t use their names. She rarely uses their titles. To an outsider, it might sound like she is, but everyone in this room knows the truth: Harrow is calling upon the relationship owed to her by blood and birth and broken promises.

Pelleamena Novenarius rises from her throne. “What _right_?” she demands, and the hall rattles with her rage. “You are a _scrap_ , a _disappointment_ ; it is a mercy you have ability with the blade at all!”

“I stand as cavalier primary,” Harrow says, and her heart is wild in her chest as it hadn’t been since she was whipped for her _previous_ “transgression” of claiming Samael’s chain for herself. She was tacitly forgiven for that. She was allowed to use her chosen weapon. She has every belief this will end the same way. Harrow simply hopes it won’t require _Gideon_ to intervene. Again. “Is there anyone with the ability to challenge me?”

The hall is deadly in its silence.

It’s not true silence; Gideon’s still breathing, loud and heavy despite the Ninth House’s desire to be corpse-quiet in all things. Harrow supposes she and her Parents are breathing as well, but they at least have the courtesy to be discrete about it.

Priamhark says, “She has a point.”

Harrow doesn’t move, even when she hears Gideon whisper, “It’s the rapier,” off to the side, where she should be standing witness and not commenting unless called upon.

Pelleamena collapses back onto the throne with a scowl, this time for her husband. “My dear,” she says, and they lapse into a _look_ that holds a conversation. Harrow, bitterly, wishes she could do that with someone. 

(She does not think about Gideon, whose every motion she has watched their entire lives, and whose every sigh holds volumes of information.)

A crackle of bones comes from where Gideon stands, and Harrow scowls at her. Gideon grins, unperturbed as ever, and gives her a thumbs-up.

Harrow hastily averts her eyes. She prefers the saccharine nature of her Parents’ _look_ to Gideon’s irreverent ways.

“Very well,” Pelleamena says, after a minute has passed and Harrow can hear the telltale signs of Gideon getting bored begin to permeate the hall. “Kneel, Harrowhark Novagesimus.”

Harrow bites the inside of her lip at hearing her full name, and kneels. The cold stone bites into her knees, and there is nothing to defend them save threadbare fabric. The Ninth House does not have armor suited for her size. The cast-off pieces she has shaved down to wrap around her limbs are scratched and ill-fitting, suitable for practice but nowhere near _functional_ in the way Ortus’ reforged plates had been.

She had killed him despite that difference. She knows how deeply it pays to be underestimated. She knows every crack in the shell surrounding her, and she uses those cracks as bait.

“Gideon,” Priamhark calls. “You too.”

Gideon collapses beside Harrow in a cacophony of noise. Out of the corner of her eyes, Harrow see’s Gideon’s mouth stretched out in a joyous smile.

“Swear the oath of a cavalier primary, Harrowhark,” the Reverend Father says.

Slowly, the words tumbling out of her mouth like the Stone the Ninth House was built to guard, Harrow does.

At the end, she turns to Gideon, whose face is rapturous. “One life,” Harrow says, staring into the golden eyes that have defined every aspect of her life since they arrived, “one end.”

Gideon clasps her hand, squeezing hard enough to hurt. “One life,” she agrees, “one end.”

“Off with you,” Pelleamena says, and the depth of disgust in her voice could power a battalion. “Let them know that the Ninth House hasn’t fallen, no matter what they might say.”

Harrow yanks her hand out of Gideon’s and rises. She bows, perfectly, as she has been taught, and says, “Of course, Mother.”

Gideon stands up too, much more casually, and says, “It’s showtime, Nova. Let’s go.”

Harrow resists the urge to say _Fuck off_ only because the Reverend Mother and Father of the Ninth House are still within earshot. She turns and paces out of the room at Gideon’s side, as is proper for a cavalier primary.

She might not like where she is, but Harrow can’t wait to see where they’re going.


End file.
